When power demands exceed available supply, utilities face the problem of how to shed power loads on short notice. The need to shed power loads often occurs during the day, primarily in the afternoon, when the generation of power is not sufficient to meet power needs. Presently, under the new deregulated environment, numerous suppliers offer power for sale on the open market. Each power company must be able to purchase sufficient power for their consumers, typically under contracts with suppliers for certain amounts at specific prices. If demand exceeds those amounts, the power companies have to purchase additional power at the “spot” price of the moment, which is often much higher than the price for power under standard contracts.
An alternative to purchasing expensive power is to cut power usage by consumers during periods of peak demand. Short of rolling blackouts or brownouts, which create havoc, options for shedding loads on a large scale within a short time frame require unreasonable expense for the consumer.
Some might suggest using “smart” meters for such purposes, particularly as more of them are being installed on power grids. However, a power utility company has very limited communications means for its smart meter network. A smart meter can be used to cut power completely at its location or even read a meter, but, presently, it is impractical to use the meters to operate thousands of devices at one time, as the communications rates do not permit a great deal of traffic on the network. Further, even if such capability were to become possible, only the utility could perform such load shedding, not the electrical power provider.
A need exists for a system and device that allows any entity, whether it be the retail energy supplier, the power utility, or the consumer, to cut off a non-critical portion of its power demand, as needed. The system and device should not be part of the power grid, should be past the demarcation of the utility, and should be present at the consumer's own circuit breaker box without requiring relays or extensive re-wiring in the path of the power distribution.